


Who Will Love You?

by orphan_account



Category: Cinderella 2015
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-18
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-31 04:48:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3964960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lace, parasols and money. That was all her vain and selfish stepfamily thought of as Farmer John lay an old branch in her hands. His face was dark with anger at their meaningless and petty worries being voiced at such an inappropriate time, but obediently left as Ella thanked him and closed the door, tears staining her once pristine face. No one left to love, or anyone to love her, she realised with a heartfelt sob, thinking of her honest and loving father who strived for nothing but bringing pure and unconstricted happiness to his home, friends and family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Who Will Love You?

Tell my love to wreck it all, cut out all the ropes and let me fall

Ella had been reading aloud to her father when he had broached the precarious and sensitive subject of a remarriage. The Master of the Mercer's Guild had left a widow of like age to her father, with two girls to provide for, and Ella had been overjoyed for him. Said gentle women would not replace her mother, and her father acknowledged that also, but perhaps fill a whole in her fathers and her own life that had been sorely lacking. At just seventeen, Ella was not expected to govern the household singlehandedly, Ilene the Housekeeper ruling most of the practical issues, and now that a stepmother was soon to be on hand chance might have it that Ella would not need to tackle the many issues a country estate offered. No matter who the woman was, no matter how her daughters acted (though Ella was convinced that they would be the most charming and respectable of girls), Ella loved her father and would embrace anyone he cared for with open arms. Her love for her father would change her entire life, rip it from it's high and sunlit place about the clouds for what might have become an eternity. 

My my my, my my my, my-my my-my...right in the moment this order's tall

Admittedly she had a slight frame, Ella knew that, but she would not compare herself to a broom - or call her hair stringy, for that matter. However, it was not kind to dwell on such trivial comments and did no justice to those who made them, so Ella ignored them as best she could and accepted their words that could be considered...complimentary? For one of the first times in her life she struggled with keeping to the promise she made her mother, and that saddened her into a silence that made the house grow darker. Thankfully, her father also had elective hearing when it came to the two girls and their ridiculous and offensive remarks, their mother occasionally scolding them when their expressions became either too crude or impolite to be tolerated with nervous smiles.

And I told you to be patient and I told you to be fine

Lady Tremaine adored gambling, and liberal discussion with partially intoxicated gentry, and resultantly hosting card parties was one of her favourite activities, going to great lengths to emphasise the wealth and respectability of the family while she was doing so. Expenses and economies were hardly important to her as she planned social event after social event, working most of her husbands savings into the ground as she went. But, a merchant was not a true merchant without a small understanding of subtlety and a degree of common sense and Ella, many years later, became knowledgable of a considerable income that her father had withheld from his second wife and her extravagant life style. Lady Treamine, however, was ignorant of such concealed assets and the one's she was aware of she was sure to take advantage of. 

Many times Ella had considered at least discussing the serious debt that seemingly threatened the household if they continued with such indulgences, if not forthright scolding her stepmother for her more than reckless behaviour, but always she thought better of it. Her father was, at least to her eyes, happier with this new family and it would be unthoughtful to pose such worry on him. What was a little money anyway? She needed to be patient, that was all, and Ella willed herself to be infinitely patient - even if it was one of the greatest failings her step family had. All would be fine.

And I told you to be balanced and I told you to be kind

Ella's father had come to observe his daughters behaviour, despite her great efforts to conceal her true feelings, and though he loved her for her kindness that she had inherited from his cherished late wife he at times found it troubling that she was not balanced. It was not cruel, after all, to speak out against a wrong doing if you knew it to be a wrong doing. Of course, criticising someone else was not who Ella was - nor would it ever be - and so her father was forced to set aside his concerns, theorising that if her life became intolerable than he would be informed or at least notice. He didn't realise that he might not always be there for her, his greatest and most beloved treasure. He was a merchant by trade, and tended not to keep the precious finery and assorted items that found there way into his hands, but he would keep Ella for as long as he could. If his jewel wished to wed - which she might someday - he would have to inspect the quality of the proposed gentleman, no matter what his breeding or position. Returning to the point, he concluded that his daughter very much ought to allow herself a break in the perpetual kindness once in a while, but that wasn't her nature and he knew she never would. 

And now all your love is wasted, then who the hell was I?

Ella was left alone when her father departed for one of his business trips, and tended to avoiding her step family if she could. They didn't care for her very much either, it seemed, as they never objected to her absence, or even noticed it. If they did, they remained firmly silent on the matter. Of course, Ella could not always find errands that called her to town or an exhausting task that she could help the servants with and so spent sometime in the company of her stepfamily. She found it frustrating, if anything. At first, she had decided it would be insightful, to see what they thought. Ella soon learnt that her stepsisters at least did not think if they could avoid it, and her stepmother did not encourage them to improve their simple minds. Ella hated herself for the negative things she thought, from the slight inadequacy she had come to accept in Drisella's singing voice to the lack of talent that was prominent in Anastasia's drawing and worst of all, for the feeling she had when her stepmother requested her to do things. She came to suspect that she was intentionally making her life difficult, and her suspicions were confirmed when Lady Tremaine so obviously dropped a dish of biscuits, after espying Ella's - frightened? - glance at Anastasia after a particularly dreadful key as the stepsister sung at the pianoforte. 

Sometimes, when Ella felt anger flushing her skin and seizing her heart, she felt like the advise and live her mother had given her was useless, that she could not even keep her temper in check. Her father once told her that it was not a horrible thing to have hateful thoughts or dark musings, what was important was merely what you acted on. He tended to say merely a lot, and remembering that caused Ella to miss him even more. 

Who will love you?

It had been curious to find no letter addressed to her when the mail from town was delivered to the Manse, and Ella ignored the theories she had over her stepmother - or Madam, as she supposedly preferred - relishing her dismay at her fathers silence. Not that she could grudge it of him, he was busy and travelling was a synonym with exertion if anyone could be believed. It was really no wonder he had no time to write to Ella, though she thought it odd, as he had always been able to make the time before. Late that evening, however, Ella's world was going to come crashing down about her in all the calm of frothing waves and raging torrents that hurricanes offered the sea. 

Lace, parasols and money. That was all her vain and selfish stepfamily thought of as Farmer John lay an old branch in her hands. His face was dark with anger at their meaningless and petty worries being voiced at such an inappropriate time, but obediently left as Ella thanked him and closed the door, tears staining her once pristine face. No one left to love, or anyone to love her, she realised with a heartfelt sob, thinking of her honest and loving father who strived for nothing but bringing pure and unconstricted happiness to his home, friends and family. 

Who will fight?

No one left to fight for or protect her from the strife life inflicted on sweet dispositioned and trusting people. She had no one left to care for or worry after, either. Her father was dead, gone to feel her mothers warm embrace again and leaving her an eighteen year old orphan with no means to provide for herself. That was life, that was the tragedy of loving and caring and Ella felt it's bitterness keener than anyone else. Her mind remained on her father, not thinking of the frivolities others might have in her position - that she was, in fact, unmarried and without a male guardian to introduce her to society had no hope of agency, even within the lower class. To most eyes, she was completely stranded where she was, unable to move forward or back. Ella, however, recognised the stupidity in such worries and did not bother to think of them. She did not even give thought to her stepmother, or what devious snare she was planning as Ella wept at the front door, curled in a ball and cradling the first - and possibly last - branch to brush her departed father's shoulder. 

And who will fall far behind?


End file.
